I can understand why Senate Republicans are angry about the recent change in the Senate’s filibuster rules. It means that their agenda of obstruction just got a lot harder. But all their righteous indignation is ringing hollow.

Yesterday, Sen. Chuck Grassley, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, issued a statement [1]attacking the committee’s chairman, Sen. Patrick Leahy, for saying [2]he would consider changing committee policies to make it harder for Republican senators to hold up nominations.

The reason Leahy has to even consider policy changes in committee is that GOP senators, in an attempt at retribution for the “nuclear option,” have repeatedly brought up an obscure rule [2]that allows them to prevent the Judiciary Committee from meeting. They have also prevented the committee from meeting[3] by simply not showing up, ensuring the lack of a quorum. Along with threats that Republican senators would refuse to return their “blue slips” signaling approval for hearings on home-state nominees, Sen. Leahy was faced with the prospect of not being able to process any nominees. Senate Republicans have literally not been allowing “the world’s greatest deliberative body” to deliberate on judicial nominations.

And the reason why Senate Democrats were driven to change the filibuster rules for presidential nominees in the first place was that the Republican minority was blocking nominees to positions they just didn’t want the president to be allowed to fill. In other words, they were using the Senate’s rules of obstruction in an attempt to nullify laws they did not like and reverse the results of the presidential election[4].

This didn’t promote “deliberation.” It shut the entire process down.

This sanctimonious whining from Grassley and his fellow obstructionist Republicans isn’t fooling anyone. Personally, I would have preferred not to have gotten to this place. My guess is that Senator Leahy would as well. But when you’re trying to govern a country and the minority party won’t let you complete even the most basic tasks of governance, there really is no choice. Comity has to be a two-way street.

The high and mighty act doesn’t work when you’re behaving like a child.